Here is a link to an article about Thomas Malthus.
http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/history/malthus.html
Malthus's views were largely developed in reaction to the optimistic views of his father and his associates. He predicted population would outrun food supply, leading to a decrease in food per person. This prediction was based on the idea that population if unchecked increases at a geometric rate whereas the food supply grows at an arithmetic rate. Only misery, moral restraint and vice (which for Malthus included contraception) could check excessive population growth. Malthus favoured "moral restraint" (including late marriage and sexual abstinence) as a check on population growth. He did however favor visiting the houses of ill repute (prostitution) so that the married women would have less chance of becoming pregnant.
http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/history/malthus.html
Malthus's views were largely developed in reaction to the optimistic views of his father and his associates. He predicted population would outrun food supply, leading to a decrease in food per person. This prediction was based on the idea that population if unchecked increases at a geometric rate whereas the food supply grows at an arithmetic rate. Only misery, moral restraint and vice (which for Malthus included contraception) could check excessive population growth. Malthus favoured "moral restraint" (including late marriage and sexual abstinence) as a check on population growth. He did however favor visiting the houses of ill repute (prostitution) so that the married women would have less chance of becoming pregnant.
Malthusian catastrophe: is a return to subsistence - level conditions as a result of agricultural (or, in later societies; economic production being eventually outstripped by growth in population.
arithmetic growth for resources: in this case ,subsistence level food resources are at best exhibit arithmetic growth, which means food increasing by a fixed absolute amount in a fixed amount of time.
geometric growth: in this instance the fixed doubling time for population
So what does Malthus suggest? Misery and Vice. The acting agents of misery and vice are war, famine, and disease. Misery can also be accelerated by:
A. Tillage over pasturage: Grains, legumes to more efficiently feed
B. Agriculture over manufacture: Can't afford to lose sources of food production
C. Moral restraint: Don't have children until you can feed them!
D. Free labor market: People should be free to move about and freely take work wherever it is available.
E. Abolish parish-laws and establish workhouses: Avoid the vicious cycle initiated by public assistance for the poor, which only encourages people to have children beyond their means.
Please understand that he is not predicting the end of the world due to poverty and hunger; rather that at some point humans will hit the " glass ceiling" and that some type of check will necessarily have to fall into place.
Natalie says:
ReplyDeleteyes i agree more with him..his seems more true..For example i totally agree with -Moral restraint: Don't have children until you can feed them!-...and people should take work wherever it's available...i strongly believe growing population would eventually come to an end by famine, disease, or war!..it's more real than Hardin's ideas
I think that Malthus has some good concepts such as poor people should not have children if they can not support them. Thats basically just common sense. He talks about welfare in a sense of the fact that helping the poor is a practice that should not be done and the truth of the statement is that welfare is the reason people have children they cannot support, because it allows them to qualify for gov't support which means they can be lazy. Granted, this is not the case for all people on welfare and some actually need it, but a vast number of individuals use and abuse the system. The whole thing about having regular sessions with the local prospitute was where he went crazy. He talks about abstinence and moral restraint, and so he wont sleep with his wife but he will some dieases infested harlot? That just doesnt make sense because the prostitue can get pregnant just like his wife and he will have to use contraception to prevent this from happening. Why not just use the contraception with his wife and avoid cheating along with the risk of disease all together?
ReplyDeleteAnyways, teh whole idea of misery and vice being the key to population control is slightly depressing. While war and famine are effective at such task, there are also rational and peaceful ways to control population safely and with benefit to the world as a whole. People just need to be rational and live within their means and population along with resource deplettion will be no problem.
Malthus seems to lean toward the lower income population is breeding like crazy.Maybe this is true today if we had references to most families receiving assistance and the size of those families. This all references back to our fine safety net we have in place. We have eradicated "Survival of the fittest" and replaced it with just get by and reproduce and we got your back. Its not like our society has the challenges and adversity of say the cave man like hunting food for family and if there wasn't enough someone would suffer and not to mention not getting eaten by dinosaurs. In a round about way all the challenge and threat of not making it has paved the way for just the bare minimum and the relaxation in the state will take care of you If you want to have a dozen kids. What kind of effect will this increasing trend have on us in the future or will we inevitably overpopulate and destroy ourselves in a apocalyptic future with more people than resources.
ReplyDeleteWhy would you just pop out kids if you cant afford to feed and care for them. It makes no sense to me and it is the poor people doing this which makes even less sense. I believe there should be limits on children if they are already being supported by the govt. All their doing is making themselves even more in need and expect us to care for them. And then this contraceptive deal about visiting hoe houses is a load of bull crap because they may be on stuff but if they are doing "something" more and more the risk of being pregnant shoots up and then the govt has to care for there kids since they would not have the resources. I mean I understand that the population will hit that glass ceiling but do these ideas really have any chance of making a difference or will a brand new idea have to come about. Like Logan says "Cannibalism is the answer."
ReplyDeleteI believe Mathus actually has an idea that if followed & implemented could solve the growing population problem, as well as many problems in todays society. If people could restrain themselves & stop popping out children that they do not want or need, it would dramatically change America. Those children that are born are usually unwanted & fall into crime or follow in their parents footsteps of abusing welfare programs. Then it just continues in a never-ending spiral. If this cycle could actualy be ended there is no telling how far the positive results could reach.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Malthus on some things such as the welfare issue. Welfare is one of the things that is bring down our economy it seems as if we have more people being supported by welfare then those who are actually supporting themselves. What makes it so bad is that a large part of the people being support by welfare could actually take care of themselves if they actually tried.
ReplyDeleteMalthus is on the same course of thought as Harding as far as the fact that Population is a problem, but the way that the two men have come up with to solve this situation is different. In the Tragedy of the Commons Harding was all about breeding out people that don't belong. Malthus suggests not even letting them be born. He suggests, in my opinion, immoral suggestions. I mean I know some people can back me up here, and not to be religious or anything, but doesn't it say in the Bible that adultery is wrong? Isn't that what Malthus is suggesting? What about the women's side of things? Men are probably going to like the idea, but what about the wives of those men? What about how they feel about their husbands thinking that its okay for them to sleep with other women? WRONG!!!!
ReplyDeleteIts just a sad world we live in if the only answer to satisfying desires that are overpopulating us is by encouraging prostitution. Like Megan said this kind of behavior would shred our moral fabric into pieces.It would go against religious beliefs and beliefs of hardworking committed couples.Not to mention disease to single men who later start a family.Hopefully our society will never sink this far into the toilet. We have given people too many excuses to not be responsible adults and until we set some stricter limitations these issues will always remain.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Jake in that if we through away our morality our whole society will be lost. I agree with Malthus in that there should be a regulation on clildren being supported with the welfare system. But the idea of married men visiting with prostitutes is completely in imoral in my eyes.
ReplyDeleteWell our world populations is a proximatly 6 billion, and suposidly it will peak at 10 billion in the next centruy. Can the earth support this many people here on earth??? we already have staving people throughout the world how can support 4 billion more individuals?
ReplyDeleteWith overpopulation it seems problems such as pollution will only increase exponentially!
there is no way that the world could support 10 billion people. we are depleting our natural resources as it is. and taxes are already trying to cover the cost of people living off the government anyway.
ReplyDeleteIt sounds to me like welfare is being used as a common. If we cut it off, isn't that coercian. Granted,the conciousless win if we don't coerce them. Unless we find a way to grow food in outer space, neeglecting morals is going to be the only solution, to our population problem. And why don't we combine both of the population experts ideas. Lets just give every hooker an std that sterilizes sperm. Im sure modern science can do that.
ReplyDeletethanks for the shoutout toph
ReplyDeleteI agree with Megan Y..he is going against the bible!
ReplyDeleteI think we all agree that you shouldn't have kids unless you can feed them, but what if you're a farmer, and you have to have children to farm, then there is a drought. I don't know. I believe Malthus, generally speaking, had a point. But to the glass ceiling idea, have we already reached that point? That Earth can only support so many of us? Especially with our per capita earnings. And if we haven't reached that point yet, won't new technologies continue to "raise the ceiling"?
ReplyDeletei do like his comments about welfare and ariel is rite we shouldnt have to and our economy is in a bad place ob behalf of it. also if you can afford yourself dont have kids common sense
ReplyDeletegood point ashton sometimes we can't predict the future..like now..some bankers who have five kids..are loosing jobs..what are they going to do?
ReplyDeleteJust to go with what has been said on welfare, I believe that there is no real right or wrong, its almost preference because its either supporting bums because of loopholes and people who really need it, or supporting no one, and having truly unfortunate people die. no one wins
ReplyDeleteAnna,
ReplyDeleteisn't that nature though? some of a population survive and some don't. those are the checks nature puts on everything....as people, if we worry about others and then does that makes us a person of conscience....and then we might be in trouble......
matt i just saw that on the news..how strange!!
ReplyDeletebut anyways what about morals and ethics..?
I think morals and ethics play a huge role in this decision. Some stand by their morals and they will never change. Others will change theirs morals/ethics based on what other individuals say. Everyone has a view on how things should be and how to act upon them. For example if someone deeply believes in what the Bible teaches then they will stick by and it and will defend it if anyone trashes it.
ReplyDeleteJustin says:
ReplyDeleteThe Malthusian view on human population and condition is a very valid one. This view of life epitomizes the “survival of the fittest” outlook on life in regards to human evolution. Only the “fittest” survive. Only the “fittest” breed the next generation. Only the “fittest” can live a comfortable life. Of course “fittest” does not mean strong and ripped, but fittest means the ability to adapt to changes in the environment over several generations. Malthus hypothesized that population grows geometrically, while food production grows arithmetically. He said that famine, disease, and poverty were all natural “glass ceilings” that prevented population from getting too large. I whole-heartedly agree with that. If it were not for the poverty in some countries and the disease in some countries, especially in third-world areas, famine would be an even bigger concern than it already is in some of these places. We would see more and more people native to these areas running around looking like an escapee from a modern-day Holocaust torture camp. These emaciated people would be suffering even more than they might be now! In these areas where famine was prevalent, so too would poverty and disease. Obviously with no money to get immunizations or vaccines from disease, disease rates would increase, death rates would more than likely increase from these diseases as well because their immune system is so weak due to the malnutrition. It is a very vicious cycle, but that is “survival of the fittest” at its very core. Malthus also stated that “moral restraint” (abstinence) and “vice” (contraception) could curtail unprecedented population growth. He seemingly blamed the lower classes for such problems as poverty, famine, and disease. The lower classes would produce more children to help the family. This has been the case throughout human history. Large families mean more help in the field and more help in raising appropriate funds necessary. It defies logic that large families could do that! Large families simply mean more costs. More food! More clothing! More debts! More problems! There really is no way, however, of keeping population in check. Morally and ethically it is not our place. Who are we to tell others to have one child or two? This country has multiple children (as is the case with the Octo-Mom). Should she have her tubes tied and never bare children again? Yes! But, how can we legally, ethically, and morally tell her she cannot. It is not a law that a woman have a set amount of children! Unless you live in China. And we all know how those limitations worked out...
i agree with malthus because if you cant afford a kid then you have no right in having them but if you do it is your kid and your choice
ReplyDeleteI totally agree with this guy, if everyone possessed the same views as him, population issues would be minor. I mean I would think we were pretty close to reaching the point of more humans then the earth can support, so Malthus's ideas are something that should be taken into consideration. Bottom line is that if you can't afford to care for a kid, you shouldn't be having them.
ReplyDeleteI agree that as technology and medical research continue to counter diseases and we discover new ways to produce food unnaturally our popultation will rise but more people means less natural resources, and more pollution. There are also new diseases all the time so while one area may rise the others still have a great affect on the population so i don't think the glass ceiling will rise very much.
ReplyDeleteMalthus is correct in saying that in saying that you shouldnt be having kids if you can't take care of them. Maybe we should look into what Johnathan Swift says in "A Modest Proposal" says. If we can't take care of them, we should let them take care of us...as food and profit. haha.
ReplyDeletejustin says
ReplyDeleteTragedy Question
As much as we think it would be nice to have the best-looking and most intelligent people walking around on this planet, it would be a shame if we lost all the diversity. Let us say we wanted to breed the “perfect” skin color: First question, who determines the “perfect” skin color? Everyone has their own opinion of what is desirable. How would we breed the “perfect” hair color or eye color? There again, who determines what traits are more desirable than others? But, breeding someone based on conscience is impossible. You cannot breed someone with a particular character trait, and I hate to say it, but having a conscience is a character trait, because there is not a gene for character traits like that (you can tell I am in AP Biology). Some have a conscience, some do not. If we found a conscience gene, then we could “experiment” with breeding that character trait. But, many people have brought this up on the blog and in class: You cannot breed something that does not have a “breedable” trait (such as character). Also, where do you draw the line at playing God? It seems like if we selectively picked what our children were born with, it smacks of blasphemy and arrogance on our part to think we could outdo nature and/or God! Where is the “fun” in having a baby if you cannot tell what is wrong with it? I know it sounds weird, but it takes away from the fact that parents are supposed to love their children regardless of traits. Regardless of race, eye color, hair color, character, judgment, orientation, height, weight, etc., etc., etc.
lawson says: i think we need to start funding nasa so we can go to another galaxy because eventually the sun is going to explode and population will not matter then.
ReplyDeleteThe whole idea of abstinence and late marriage seems naive to me. I suppose this could theoretically work, but as practical guy i don't believe this "solution" has any real potential.
ReplyDeleteI agree with malthus, why would you want to put your own child through struggled times in the first place if you can't afford them. however i also agree with ben because i don't believe it has potential.
ReplyDelete